#*waves the adoption papers*’ just to be annoying. And we know Dick canonically has some complex feelings about the whole

[kittykatninja321]

Bruce has 3 1st sons: Dick is the first child he took in/raised, Jason is the first kid he adopted/legally claimed as his own, Damian is his first bio kid/would’ve existed before Jason’s adoption, so could technically be considered the 1st kid that is “legally” his, even if wasn’t aware of his existence yet

[renaroo]

New to the Family

Disclaimer: Batman and associated characters are the creative property of DC Comics. Warnings: Canon-typical violence & language, Canon character death mentioned, Mild adoption discrimination at the beginning Rating: T Synopsis: In the months following the death of Tim Drake, Bruce Wayne is seeking to adopt Duke Thomas and Cassandra Cain. Of course, what this could mean for them and what this could mean for their soon-to-be brother Damian differs greatly for each of them. 

A/N: Basically, I’ve got some complaints with the Rebirth continuity’s take on the Batfamily and it is this: why is Cass not canon adopted yet and why haven’t Damian, Duke, and Cass had any on-panel time together because. Hello. This is gold! So I seek to remedy this in the brief time we have before Tim’s inevitable return to the comics so I can make it a touch angsty ; ) 

Duke Thomas had taken a long time to look over the paperwork. He read the fine print, understood every litigation of it, and took into consideration what exactly it meant as much as he possibly could without a law degree. Then he repeated the process nearly every night of that week.

He had not expected anything to come of his prolonging of a suitable answer. Honestly, he half expected that the subject would have dropped entirely until he brought it up.

Bruce seemed just that awkward and Alfred seemed just that understanding.

So he should have known at once that the question looming over him, the one he had refused to commit to an answer to as of yet, would be pressed by an unforeseen outside force. Some third party. Some… mild annoyance that was determined on making himself known to Duke one way or another regardless of circumstance.

When Duke walked into his — how strange to think, but yes the room was his — room after taking a shower only to find the door opened and his desk with the guardianship papers on it occupied by a prickly headed thorn of Duke’s perpetual side.

Which was slightly unfair given, with the size of Wayne Manor, how uncommon it was for the two of them to actually run into one another. Especially since Duke half suspected that Bruce had very specifically made their schedules as polar opposite as possible.

“My father’s signature is hardly ever this well written. He has three more hesitation marks in his stroke than usual. He put a lot more thought into his signature on these than he did any of the company’s paperwork. Chicken scratch that was,” Damian Wayne said, sitting at Duke’s seat without so much as turning to greet the teenager.

Duke rubbed his head with his towel one last time and then yanked it off with a snap. It was too early — by Bat standards, anyway — for them to be getting into this. Whatever this consisted of, Duke was not having it.

“Alfred told you to stop invading my room,” Duke reminded him. “I don’t want to have to go to Bruce—“

“And I recall telling all of you that this is my ancestral home and if there is somewhere you don’t want me to be then you should set traps,” Damian responded, looking over his shoulder with an arched brow. “Drake understood that. I only had to tell him once and he booby trapped an entire wing of the Manor. I underestimated at the time what a rare sign of diligence that had been.”

Annoyed, Duke began rolling his towel over his wrist. “How would I get into my own room if I designed some trap to keep you out of it?”

“You couldn’t, because I’m better than you,” Damian replied, turning around in the desk and steepling his fingers against each other. “I’m better than Drake… was, too. But the effort was appreciated.”

“Are you this cranky before breakfast all the time or is it just something special you bring to me once a week?” Duke asked, walking over to his bed and beginning to make it, just as he always had at home.

“I do not do anything of substance for you, Thomas,” Damian was quick to remind him. “However my father is my business, and his signature on these documents prove a commitment to you. Making you my business. Considering that they are dated nearly a month ago, it makes your lack of efficiency and general bringing of stability into the Manor my business.”

Duke finally looked back at Damian as he fluffed his pillows. “It’s your business that I haven’t agreed to be your father’s ward yet?” he asked critically.

“Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?” Damian replied curtly. “The only time he cares about his signature’s legibility so much as to hesitate at a nearly fifty percent uptick are when he is dealing with some sort of matter dealing with the family. I’ve made it my business to read through as many of his documents kept in the house and the main office of Wayne Enterprises as I could before… Father put a stop to it by upgrading his safe locks. And his signature only looked like this and he only acted so irrationally as to leave his signature without seeing through the other’s signature when it has been matters of guardianship and adoption.”

There was a part of Duke that desperately wished to call bullshit on a good amount of what was coming out of Damian’s mouth. But he thought better of it. He didn’t need to unleash anybody’s wrath, and there was no telling how long this brat was thinking of keeping him from breakfast.

Still, he couldn’t let it all go untested. “You read through that many documents, huh?” Duke questioned sardonically.

“Yes. And comparatively, a good amount of them had to deal with adoption and guardianship, so I have cases for comparison,” Damian replied before jumping to his feet and pulling his hoodie over his head. “You don’t seem very interested in becoming a Wayne, Thomas. Not even in the periphery. That’s unusual, though maybe with some amount of intelligence.”

Duke squinted at Damian curiously. “What do you mean by that?”

There was a predatory sharpness to Damian’s eyes as he walked past Duke and toward the hallway. “The last three members who joined this family paid for it with their lives. I’m wondering what the name Wayne will cost you.”

Surprised by the veiled threat, Duke watched over Damian and scowled. “I never wanted to be a Wayne,” he answered lowly, though Damian did not react if he even heard it.

Further annoyed that he allowed a literal child get to him, Duke walked over to his desk to straighten the paperwork only to find that it wasn’t only his guardianship papers on the desk anymore. The young Wayne heir had actually brought in the other documents he had been bragging about. Including the adoption papers for Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, and Tim Drake.

For a moment, Duke soaked in the fact that Damian had not been lying about the thoughtfulness in Bruce’s signature on each of the papers, and how they compared.

Until the moment where he flipped to the paper beneath the adoption records and found not one but two wrinkled, damaged paper copies that felt ready to tear. The signatures on them were significantly more chicken scratch like Damian had spoken of before.

And Duke’s heart dropped when he saw why.

Death certificates. For one Jason Todd and one Tim Drake.

The date of the latter had been less than a month — had been since the time of Bruce’s signature on Duke’s guardianship papers.

A sick feeling began to come over him.

Bruce hadn’t been awkward, he had been mourning. Alfred hadn’t been respectful, he had been preparing for funerals and meetings.

Damian hadn’t been annoying. He had been sizing up Duke’s worth in the wake of losing a brother.

And Duke himself… well, he didn’t feel very tall for not realizing any of that at all.

Christine opened the door in the wooden floor. She seemed to have less difficulty with the maneuver that night than she had in the times previous — muscle memory and a penchant for trying to show more control around Cass since she had explained to her how she followed conversations for the most part without being able to really understand the words for it.

The ballerina shoved some books across the floor ahead of her, eyes toward her feet precariously balanced on the rungs of the ladder, door balanced on her shoulders. She hadn’t yet looked up and Cassandra was simply watching her with uncertainty how Christine’s arrival was going to change things.

“Sorry, practice ran long. And mom’s getting onto me about how my study group isn’t getting a whole lot of studying done so I’m going to have to read my biology book tonight instead of continuing Wuthering Heights tonight if that’s okay,” Christine announced, pushing the books some more and beginning to pull herself up into the loft before freezing in her tracks, mouth slightly hung open in surprise.

Cassandra smiled gently and waved to Christine, though it did not take a world class body language expert to know the ballerina’s attention was on the other three bodies in the room.

“You didn’t tell us you had someone coming over,” Nightwing — Dick — joked before he rubbed Cass’ head like she was a child.

She leaned into the touch. “You… didn’t say you were… here tonight,” she argued back.

Christine still hadn’t moved, even when the weighted hatch of the loft door kicked back and hit her shoulders with more weight. Her mouth was still slack and her eyes focused on Bruce and Kate.

Bruce seemed sourly displeased. “You didn’t inform me that someone knew you were living here,” he said accusingly.

Confused by his change in attitude, Cassandra shrugged at him. She didn’t entirely have the vocabulary to respond with what she thought should have been obvious. They had never asked.

“Oh my god, that’s Bruce Wayne…” Christine gasped. “I mean. You. You’re Bruce Wayne. And you’re… in the ballet studio’s… attic…”

Rolling her eyes as Bruce went into stoic thought, Kate moved past the lot of them and reached out to offer Christine her hand and lift her the rest of the way up into the loft. “Forgive my cousin. The tabloids might be onto something about all the partying and the car wrecks causing some blunt coarseness in his old age.”

“I’m not old,” Bruce argued immediately.

“Not to be blunt myself, but I am twenty-five now so…” Dick began with a flip of his wrist, earning a stern look from Bruce. As usual, Dick returned it with a snide smile.

“You’re Kate Kane,” Christine managed to get out once she was on her feet and standing among the gathering in the loft.

“Well you’re definitely more caught up on your Gothamite gossip than you are on your biology. Your mother might be onto something,” Kate joked.

“No, I know you… from the recitals. You come with Cassandra sometimes, I always… never knew what to think about it,” Christine explained before looking to Cass with confusion. “I thought you were… y’know… a runaway from the orphanage they sponsored. The Martha Wayne Foundation’s one? That’s how I thought you knew them and why you lived up here.”

Cass shook her had. “I… am the Orph—“

Before Cass could get the words out, Dick clapped his hands down on her shoulders and let out a dry laugh. “She’s a former runaway. And she lived up here until now because… well we finally learned this is where she was living.” He gave Bruce and Kate sly glances. “Almost had to hire a detective to find out what should have been obvious.”

Raising a brow at Dick for his behavior, Cass politely peeled his hands off her shoulders and shook her head at him. “She knows.”

The three of them looked at her.

“What?” they collectively asked at once.

“Cassandra, if they don’t know,” Christine began to stage whisper as she approached Cass.

Annoyed at everyone’s need to treat her as if she was not in control of or at least mildly aware of the situation they were in at the moment, Cass shook her head and crossed her arms. “No. Everyone here knows. I’m the Orphan. Christine…” Cass looked at her affectionately. “She is good. I trust her.”

Christine blinked with surprise at first before growing a small, subtle smile of her own and tucking some of stray curls behind her ears.

“I’m not entirely sure what’s going on here but…” Christine continued, glancing awkwardly toward the prestigious Wayne family then to the boxes stacked behind them, “you… uh, seem to be moving my study partner out of her attic.”

Cassandra knew that Christine’s observations were fairly true and as a result merely looked to Bruce, Kate, and Dick curiously for a response to the odd situation they all found themselves in. She still wasn’t entirely sure why the Belfry and the attic were not good enough accommodations on their own, or why the rush to move her from them had been increased since the Spoiler’s most recent escapades and the League of Assassins’ attack. The answer was long and complicated and not entirely being explained outright whenever she had asked Bruce about it before.

It would have been interesting to, at the very least, hear an explanation for it all that was being given to someone else.

“The fact that Cassandra has been a… tenet of this ballet studio for the past few months was an oversight from us,” Bruce explained awkwardly. “Not to mention it lacks the basic necessities that one would need for long term living situations. Heating and cooling, proper bathroom access, television and cable, kitchen or just general food storage. And not to mention the inconvenience and safety hazard it gives the ballet studio.”

At once, Christine’s eyes widened then narrowed into a suspicious glare. “Do you own this ballet studio on top of every other piece of land in this town? Are you evicting a homeless girl?” she asked angrily.

Bruce seemed befuddled. “I do lease the land for the ballet company—“

Kate rolled her eyes. “No one’s being evicted. Cassandra just can’t live here anymore.”

“You people who own this town really don’t have any sense of average blight, do you?” Christine asked angrily before reaching over and grabbing Cass’ hand, drawing her closer. Cass allowed it out of curiosity and out of enjoying the sensation of being lined up alongside Christine’s side. “Fine, whatever of her things you’re tossing out with her, hand over to me. Cass and I’ll move them out as fast as you need us to. We’ll take it to my place, right, Cass?”

Despite knowing it was against the plans of everyone else, Cassandra couldn’t help but feel very appreciative of the plan. She looked at the seriousness and protectiveness in Christine’s gaze and knew it was for her, giving Cass a sense of euphoria that had escaped her recently with fighting and training having become a mundane and simple task in the Belfry.

“No, no, no,” Dick laughed, shaking his hands and head. “I’m afraid you have us all wrong… Miss…”

“Montclair,” Christine answered determinedly.

“”Miss Montclair,” Dick nodded. “You see, we’re not evicting Cassandra or working against her here at all. This isn’t throwing her out, only moving her home.”

Christine’s grip on Cass’ hand only tightened, her fingers lacing together with Cass’ own. It caused the crimefighter to blink in surprise. “And is home in the system tucked away somewhere to be forgotten again? Or at some orphanage she’s worked so hard to escape? Because if that’s the case…”

“It isn’t,” Bruce insisted. “Cassandra’s home, where it should have been for a long time now, is in Wayne Manor.”

For the first time in all the days leading up to that very night, Bruce’s intentions made complete sense to Cassandra. She could see the seriousness of his intentions and the oddly warm way in which he said the words.

Still, Christine’s grip on Cassandra did not relent. She stared at the three in confusion. “I’m not sure I understand.”

“Cass is family,” Dick surmised. He then looked at Cass with a smile and a glint in his eyes. The sort of open expressiveness he spoke in filled Cass with something akin to comfort. “And we’re trying to prove to her how glad we are to have her.”

“You see us with Cass because we have been going through the adoption process,” Kate explained, walking closer and gently running a hand through Cass’ hair. “The biggest difficulty was deciding if she was a Kane or a Wayne at the end of the day. And I’m still rooting for the former.”

“How do you even know her?” Christine said, unrelenting.

“Charity work,” the three said simultaneously.

It was not a way to impress Christine.

It almost made Cass wonder whether or not Christine was actually picking up on Cass’ intuitiveness for body language and lying.

So Cass did her best to assist. “True knows Batamn,” she answered, immediately getting pained looks from the others.

Why are you making this so much harder, their bodies seemed to be almost screaming.

“That’s right, you, like, bankroll all the superheroes in Gotham, don’t you?” Christine realized out loud, slightly covering her mouth with her fingers.

“Not all,” Bruce argued, though Dick was rolling his eyes behind Bruce again.

“Is that how you know about Cassandra?” she asked at last.

“Yes,” Cass answered in unison with the others for the first time since the whole commotion began.

Taking a breath and swallowing down his intensity for the moment, Bruce neared Christine and looked deeply within her eyes. “Miss Montclair, I appreciate your loyalty and friendship toward Cassandra more than you can ever know. Knowing she has had someone care so deeply and so firmly about her during these difficult transitions in her life has brought me a lot of relief. But it’s time for someone else to step up and provide for Cass the life she very much deserves. And that person is me.” He paused for a moment before continuing, a furrow growing between his brows. “Many years ago, I lost my family to a tragedy that I couldn’t prevent. And it’s taken most of my life since then to learn how to take those emotions and perils and turn them into something I can help others like myself through. To give family to those who need it most.”

At that, Dick placed a gentle hand on Bruce’s shoulder.

Kate, in turn, placed one on Cass’ shoulder.

“Cassandra Wayne does have a pretty nice ring to it,” Christine offered, looking a little more sheepish. “Though… Gotta say, Cass, I don’t know how much I can pay for the bus fare all the way out to Bristol all the time.”

“Not all the time,” Cass joked. “Only… half.”

There was genuine warmth in the laughter that followed.

Once Dick moved in to more properly introduce himself to Christine, Kate slightly directed Cass away from her friend and poked her side as if to tickle her. “You, little lady, need to tell me more about your fiend here, and whether or not she’s the reason we’ve been taking you to so many ballets.”

Cass could not help but laugh, tucking hair behind her ear.

Bruce was bristling. “I need to look more into her background.”

“A born father,” Kate lampooned.

Damian could almost always count on Pennyworth. His culinary skills were beyond reproach, his swiftness something that would have given even Wally West a run for his fairly lofty expectations, and his immeasurable reliability was beyond that of even Damian’s grandfather’s most trusted Ubu. Or at least, it would seem to be the case.

As it stood at the moment, Damian found himself sitting at his father’s table, alone save for the constant presence of Titus at his feet, with only the well prepared Pennyworth meal before him. No one else was around to join him for breakfast.

Tapping his fork against the table, Damian glared around himself with a soured expression. After all, lacking company for a meal when he knew the house to be at full capacity was not something he was familiar with.

Even if he knew that the reason for why was because his father had been rather clear about his options for the day.

Help with moving in the newest interloper to the estate, or eat breakfast alone. Damian had chosen the only, obvious option. Except he found he had no appetite for the french toast, tofu, and fruit and was merely pushing them around his plate while Titus slept like a log.

“Obviously if Father is not going to break on his word, I cannot either,” Damian announced to his dog.

Titus’ ears twitched at the sudden noise but he did not open his eyes or move his head from Damian’s feet.

“Which means that I cannot go back on my word either,” Damian decided. “Even if he means to shame me by spending my day away from the only activity that seems to take everyone’s attention.” He paused in thought. “I should feed Batcow, Goliath, and Alfred. But judging by the fact that you seem to not be begging at the moment for tofu means that Pennyworth has beat me to the punch.”

When Titus yawned, Damian felt his stomach twist. He lowered himself enough to look under the table at the incredibly unimpressed dog, which was at least enough to make Titus raise his head.

“You aren’t listening to a word I say, are you, boy?” Damian asked miserably.

The dog licked Damian’s cheek which might have been a sign of solidarity or an attempt to to placate Damian’s disappointment. It achieved neither and Damian sat back up before pushing his plate away from himself.

After watching the grandfather clock for a minute straight, Damian allowed his head to drop to the table’s surface immediately and he let out a long sigh.

“There you are.”

Hearing Dick Grayson’s voice snapped Damian out of his mood almost immediately and he sat back up, straight as a rod, and looked toward the entrance to the dining room. Grayson was sweaty, his hair kept back by a thin hairband that Damian knew for a fact did not belong to him, and was holding two water bottles so cold that the perspiration was dripping from the bottom.

“Catch,” Dick offered before tossing the bottle in his left hand toward Damian.

Without even a moment’s hesitation, Damian caught the water bottle and kept his steady gaze on Dick. “I haven’t been helping with the moving,” Damian reminded him evenly.

“Really? Hadn’t noticed,” Dick said, popping the lid off his own bottle. “I thought you were going to paint a mural on Cassandra’s wall for her or something.”

“Pennyworth brought up the idea of allowing me to paint a mural on a wall last week,” Damian responded. “I was only made aware of whose wall and for what long after.” He didn’t mention how he had enthusiastically accepted the idea at first, how he had explained to his father what inspirations he would take in painting the wall, and what supplies would have been needed. Or how he retched back at the discovery that it was a surprise for Cassandra Cain — daughter of David Cain, steward of Mother, the very entity who had hoped to take advantage of his father’s recent weakness in order to destroy him.

And Damian certainly did not mention the exact words of I’m very disappointed to hear that, Damian that Father had said once Damian made his own verdict clear.

“Huh,” Dick said before taking another drink, as if the information was all new to him. “I wasn’t aware that you didn’t get along with Cassie.”

“I have yet to meet her at all,” Damian answered.

“That would make it distinctly more difficult to get along with someone,” Dick joked, pulling up the seat beside Damian and pausing to smile and pet Titus when the dog got up to greet him.

“And I suppose you get along with Cassandra Cain,” Damian said before rolling his eyes and crossing his arms, looking off from Dick. “What am I even bothering with asking? Of course you do. You get along with everyone.”

“I do get along with Cassandra,” Dick answered regardless. “It was thanks to her help and Harper’s we were able to stop Mother before Bruce was… back to himself. And because of her that a lot of things that have happened lately have been stopped. She’s been an asset to Gotham.”

“Stopping my Grandfather and Lady Shiva, you mean,” Damian did his best to sound unimpressed. “I read the files. It was… unforeseen that her talent could expand to that degree.”

“She’s good,” Dick agreed. “But also the crisis with the Monster Men, the Victim Syndicate… she’s worked very hard.”

Damian glared in Dick’s direction. “Those obstacles she proved so good at… it is a shame they were all after dealing with the Colony. It’s a shame that she truly proved herself after the Colony where someone else had to suffer to make it clear how amazing and wonderful she was.”

Dick’s look hardened and he frowned at Damian. “I miss Tim, too, Damian.”

“Do you?” Damian demanded. “Last I recall, you moved to Blüdhaven having a good time establishing yourself and making a new family with that girl—“

“That’s not part of this conversation,” Dick said more harshly than Damian was used to hearing from him. “And none of it has to do with Cassandra or Duke.”

“Ugh!” Damian rolled his whole head with his eyes that time before raising his hands up in defeat. “Why must we bring up Thomas, too? I am well aware that Father seems intent on replacing Timothy with as many rooms filled up in this Manor as possible!”

“Damian, stop it,” Dick snapped angrily, his fist coming down on the table.

Surprised, Damian leaned back, eyes wide. He had not managed to upset Dick since the earliest days of them working together, since before they truly found their groove as Batman and Robin. And he certainly had not managed it in all the time since.

But Dick did not let up, his eyes were hardened and his disappointment as clear as his frown. “No one is replacing Tim. No one can replace Tim. And Bruce would never even try to do that. It’s not how family works. You don’t replace what you’ve lost. You move forward. You build new. You build more.”

Damian scowled back at Dick, his stubbornness unrelenting. “Father moved the Earth and back when he lost the two of us. He did everything to bring us back and make us safe again. Perhaps Todd has been right, perhaps—“

“First off, you never take advice from Jason,” Dick said firmly. “His our brother and I love him but… what he has gone through has warped the way he sees things.”

“Are you saying it isn’t true?” Damian snapped.

“I’m saying circumstances aren’t the same, and it’s not about what’s right or wrong or whether or not I’m trying to defend Bruce. Which, for the record, I’m not,” Dick said firmly. “My time with Spyral and how he handled your death are… Well, they were not circumstances in my control either time. I would have done things differently.” He shook his head once. “Regardless… None of it has ever had anything to do with Duke and Cass. And you shouldn’t look at it that way.”

“Maybe we should,” Damian demanded. “Because Drake is dead. And I don’t need more family who might not make it either!”

Dick wore disappointment as if he had been taught it directly from Pennyworth. Then he did something which Damian was not expecting considering the anger and vitriol being spat out by both of them.

He pulled Damian into a hug.

Damian, too surprised to really react, went limp, staring into Dick’s chest as the elder held him firmly.

“We all miss Tim, Damian,” he assured the young Robin. “And he would know that we’re all missing him. No matter what we’ve done or said before. No matter what you’ve done or said before — he would have known it. And he died because he wanted no one else to have to die that night to keep Gotham safe.”

Swallowing, Damian intently ignored the cold streaks forming across his cheeks. “If you’re attempting to make me cry, Grayson—“

“I’m not,” Dick responded softly. “All I want for you to do today, Damian, is at your own pace, to do what Tim always wished he could have gone back and done with you: try. Just try a little harder to be the one who makes this a little easier for Cass and Duke. Because adoption… it’s not easy. It’s not easy to learn how to feel you belong somewhere. And it’s really hard coming from the circumstances that they are. To lose a family that loved you before, or to have never known what one was like before.” Dick held Damian back at arm’s length, giving a meaningful look to Damian’s eyes. “I think you might be able to relate to at least one of them.”

Damian ducked his head, the intensity of that look from Dick just too much to take at the moment. “If you and Father just want me to help move them into their rooms, you could just order me—“

“I just want you to think about things, Damian,” Dick offered, finally getting to his feet and beginning to walk out of the room. “I think part of why you’re worried about how we’re treating Tim’s memory now is because you feel sick about how he might have been treated better in life. And if that’s right, then the one who would benefit the most from learning from that and becoming better isn’t Cass and Duke, it’s you.”

Dick left the dining room and Titus sat patiently beside Damian, waiting for him to do something. But Damian was waiting for the relief to kick in once Dick was out of sight, it wasn’t there, though.

In fact, he felt more miserable than before Dick had entered.

It had distracted him all day at school -- formulating the plan, attempting to figure out what tone to use, how quickly his answer should be given, whether or not it deserved any buildup, what was the most respectful way to go about things. 

Duke rode back in the limo with Alfred and Damian, ignoring the usual petty squabbling that Damian engaged in or how many times he forcibly brought up the fact that he was on the Teen Titans. His eyes were instead on the landscape passing them by through the window, his mind fixated on mustering up courage for what needed to be said. 

Alfred always had a tray of healthy snacks waiting in the foyer for them after school, but Duke couldn’t pay any attention to it because he had things to do, he had answers to give. And no strange and suspicious looks from the youngest Wayne heir was going to keep him back from what he had been building up toward all day.

“Is he in the Cave?” Duke asked, removing his sneakers quickly and his backpack even faster.

“If you are referring to Master Bruce, I’m afraid that the question answers for itself,” Alfred responded lightly.

Damian snapped on a carrot so hard it could have been taken as a threat in at least four different countries.

“Thanks, Alfred,” Duke replied before setting off himself toward the study and toward the enigmatic clock which hid within it. He barely gave any thought to the dramatic aura that was given off by all the extra which Bruce had inserted into his life even by that point. A thought that, usually, hit Duke at least twice every other day.

Not this day, however.

He opened the grandfather clock, ducked inside, and quickly descended the stairs. His school uniform was still tugging on him at all the wrong angles and he thoughtlessly began yanking off the suit coat and untucking his dress shirt as he made his way down the winding stairs.

“Bruce!” he called out. “I have to talk to you—“ Duke began only to be drowned out by the highly unusual sound of laughter echoing through the Cave. It was such an odd and unexpected noise that it actually caused Duke to stop his jog slightly and turn his head to the side curiously. “What the…”

As Duke got further down into the cave, he found himself looking at the sight of the training mat placed front and center in the cave, Bruce somehow already on the floor on his side, pushing up just enough to rub at his chin. There was an impressed grin on his face, though it seemed to only be there because his back was to his opponent and he hadn’t yet noticed Duke’s descent into the cave.

Bruce Wayne — the real Bruce Wayne — seemed… genuinely happy. And there was a part of Duke that just wasn’t certain what to even say to that.

On the other side of the ring was the mysterious Cassandra Cain, doubled over her stomach laughing so hard that tears were welling in her eyes. She was laughing at Bruce and, judging by the scene, she was probably the one responsible for flattening Bruce on his butt as he was. Which was… shocking to Duke to say the least.

Firstly, who besides a Justice Leaguer — and even then very few Justice Leaguers — could knock the Batman down. Secondly, who could do such a thing and not fear for their lives.

Cassandra was not a complete unknown to Duke. He had seen her around the Belfry, had heard a lot about her from the other members of the ever growing Batfamily, and of course she had been staying in the Manor with them for a week at that point.

But she was little more than an intimidating force in most circumstances. Duke didn’t really know her. And the idea that she could knock down Batman was… disconcerting.

“Your point is made,” Bruce conceded, straightening up his expression and rolling into a sitting position that faced Cass.

The teen girl grinned widely before getting in a ready position again and waving toward Bruce, as if she was ready for him to come straight at her once again.

Duke was stuck in place on the stairs, all his careful planning and all his big ideas built up throughout the day were out the window, completely lost. He stood and watched from the stairs and was taken completely by surprise when Alfred cleared his throat from higher up on the stairs to make himself known to the whole Cave.

Along with everyone else, Duke looked toward the butler as he descended.

“Master Bruce, I seem to recall that you promise to me before I left this afternoon was to help Miss Cassandra successfully finish a few more of her workbooks so that she could keep up with her homeschooling,” Alfred said accusingly as he passed Duke on the way down.

Cass looked away from Alfred, her lips pressed together in a bit of a huff.

“We did work some, Alfred,” Bruce promised, pushing to his feet. “And so I could reward her for her hard work by having a bit of sparring practice. We used to do that for Dick, remember? It’s a good motivator.”

Alfred seemed utterly unconvinced. “The work was not completed. If I may say so, Master Bruce, I do believe this lovely young woman can firmly say she has you wrapped around her little finger, as it were.”

That got Cass to look back again and laugh, roughly rubbing the sweat off her brow.

And in that moment, Duke could not have felt more awkward and out of place. It was like he was truly invading on something private between the three of them.

Subtle and quiet, Duke attempted to back up the stairs without drawing attention to himself, but instead found that almost immediately, his eyes were locked onto by the curious Cassandra Cain. And that look alone was enough to stop him in place.

It was then that Duke realized he had never really been one on one with Cassandra before.

“Hello,” she said with none of his reservations or hesitation. “Here for…?”

Duke blinked again, feeling a disconnect between the intensity of Cass’ gaze and the fractured question she was asking. “Uh?”

“Here for…?” Cass continued, leaning against the railing of the training area, head tilted questioningly.

It was at that moment that Duke realized his full day of preparedness, his hours of contemplation, his endless scenarios ran through his head, were completely out the window. He was unprepared all over again and locked in place, the papers folded up in his jacket pocket basically burning a whole through him.

“Uh,” he managed again.

“How was school today, Duke?” Bruce mercifully asked instead, crossing from the training area into the Cave proper and nearing where Alfred and Duke were standing. “I hope it’s not been too much of an adjustment. I know you had reservations initially about starting the new semester at a private school. And I know having Damian as your guide is… hm,” Bruce hesitated on his words for a moment before coughing into his fist and trying again. “Something of a speed course.”

“Fine,” Duke answered without really answering at all. “I, uh, I was coming down here to… you know…”

Without warning, he felt someone quickly brush past him from behind, nearly knocking him from his step. Duke turned and glared at Damian as the younger boy passed him. “Hey, would you—“ Duke stopped immediately when he saw the crumpled papers in Damian’s hands as the kid was making his way to Bruce. Even though he didn’t need to to know what had just happened, Duke reached into his pockets and confirmed that they were his papers. “Give that back!” he all but roared, half jumping down the rest of the way into the Cave.

“Damian, what’ve I told you,” Bruce hardly admonished, glancing back to the training mats.

Cassandra, quicker than Duke could manage to follow, flipped herself over the railing and over Damian’s head, landing perfectly on the other side of him with Duke’s papers in hand.

“What the— Cain!” Damian snarled.

Duke slowed to a stop beside Cass and looked at her warily. But she was all smiles, offering him the papers.

“What you’re… here for,” she said as she handed them to Duke. “Right?”

“Yeah,” he replied uneasily, wishing more than anything that something could take all the eyes in the room off of him. But he rarely got what he wanted anymore, he supposed. So Duke looked to Bruce specifically, clutching the papers tightly. “I… Well, I wanted to say I’m sorry for how long it’s taken me to give you an answer to the question you asked me, Bruce. Especially since… the question is such an honor. And I mean that — it’s an honor, truly, to be asked to be part of your family.”

Bruce was howling off, slowing his motions as it became more apparent what they were about to discuss. He looked intently at Duke, listening to his every word.

“And part of the reason I couldn’t… Part of the reason I was hesitating was because I didn’t know what it meant for me,” Duke continued. “My parents… they’re still my parents. They always will be. Even if they spend the rest of their lives needing care around the clock, even if they never recognize me when they look in my face again… They’re the people who raised me and made me the person… Tried to make me into the person I want to be someday,” Duke continued. “And I don’t want anyone to ever think that I’m ignoring that or how important it is. But… I hesitated for so long not because of them. Not really. I hesitated because… after everything you’ve been through and,” Duke glanced toward Damian then back to Bruce, “everything your family’s been through… it felt almost selfish of me to yearn for feeling like part of your family. To yearn to belong somewhere when I know that there’s so many people that need a family more than me.”

“Duke,” Bruce tried to interject.

“But that’s… today. I finally clicked,” Duke said, unfolding the papers. “Family’s not just about wanting to belong… it is belonging. And, well, I don’t think signing papers is going to confirm what’s already real so much as teach everyone what we already know.” He then showed Bruce where he had already signed the guardianship papers. “That this family is a whole lot of people who click together for a lot of weird and unexplainable reasons. And also sometimes we save the world.”

There was something unreadable behind Bruce’s eyes as he reached out and took the papers for himself to look over. But what wasn’t unreadable was the small smile that made its way to his face. That was there and it was pretty unmistakable.

“You think it’s an honor to be a part of the family,” Bruce said in a low, soft tone that Duke hadn’t heard him use before. “A part of me wants to correct you on that. I don’t know how much of an honor it is to be a part of my family. But I do know, and I can tell you that the greatest honor you could bestow on me — that anyone in this family has bestowed on me — is the honor of allowing me to call you my children. Thank you. Thank you, Duke, for being a part of this family, in every way that counts and every way that’s real.”

Duke caught his eyes swelling up with water and quickly tried to rub them away. He wasn’t expecting to feel arms wrap around him at his shoulders. It was Cassandra. And she only let go long enough to grab Damian and then Bruce to pull them in for the hug too. If Duke wasn’t so busy trying not to cry and ruin the moment, he might’ve gotten embarrassed that the two staunchest, uncuddly people he had ever met in his life were falling in line to give him a hug and welcome him into their family.

Probably more than she should have, Cass really appreciated in the afternoons when Alfred looked to his watch and decided to wrap up their lessons. Things had been much easier when it came to schoolwork back when she was in the Belfry and could memorize the answers to the questions the computer programs would test her with, or when Bruce took over for Alfred for a short while and would reward her for a few minutes of brain activity with multiple hours of physical activity.

In comparison, Alfred was a much crueler taskmaster, actually sitting through their lessons together and making her read the same sentence over and over again until she pronounced every word without so much as a stutter.

The moment he was gone, though, Cassandra was off to the cave, bounding from the stairs and onto the training station, ready for any simulation that could be thrown at her. It was her favorite part of the day, working herself into a hunger before Alfred called her up for dinner.

And that, for the most part, had been her routine since she moved into the Manor.

It was a strange place, larger than the ballet studio for sure, and much bigger than Christine’s apartment or Harper’s for that matter. It was even bigger than the Belfry which Cassandra had thought, for certain, was the largest place she had ever lived.

But the routines had been dreadfully boring, and it took longer to get to the city from the Manor than it had when she lived in her loft. Which meant less time spent on the streets, fighting crime, doing what she did best, doing what she felt was right for her.

At least, one would think so.

She missed the constant action of the streets, the crowds of people to read, but what she truly missed was…

After hitting a mechanical Killer Croc with a definitive kick, ending the current level of her program, Cass held her position, fists up, leg out stretched. It was perfect motion. Perfect motion to hurt, to maim, to k— never that again. She was too gentle, went for the shots that were not vital.

But it wasn’t the satisfaction that she was looking for.

Closing her eyes, Cassandra slowly released her fists, bent her supporting knee, extended her kicked out foot until her toes curled at just the right angle. She did not open her eyes even as her weight shifted in counter balance, as her arms extended out, her shoulders at a delicate slope until…

Her eyes opened and she held her pose without faltering. Then, with a twist beginning in her shoulders and ending on her balanced toes, Cassandra performed a perfect spin, ending with her extended foot trading places with her balancing foot. She was on her toes, arms extended to the air, chin tilted back as she brought her kicked out foot in, closer, center, spinning with her eyes locked on the light above the training platform.

Slowing, slowing, she crouched down hands extended forward with her eyes closing. She was not surrounded by machines anymore, she was surrounded by Christine and the other ballerinas from her recitals. They moved with each other, one story that did not require the endless words that she was being slowly taught by Alfred. Accents and punctuations where kicks and flips, spinning around one another, trusting every move to be perfectly matched was everything that needed to be said between them without any words being uttered.

Ah, how Cassandra missed living over the ballet studio.

She ended one routine with a slowed and saddened pace longing aching into her limbs where fatigue did not reach. Cass felt so alone that she expected the cave to not be any different until she heard the clapping.

Immediately, like flipping a switch, Cassandra readied herself, pivoting on one foot, flipping out of the training ring, and holding her fists out toward the source of the clapping. It was to her shock that it was none other than the youngest Wayne, Damian, standing there. He seemed unimpressed by her reflexes.

“Surely you know if you strike me I am made only more powerful in retaliation of striking you back,” he told her sternly.

Cass’ brows furrowed and she withdrew her fists, straightening up. Damian was a strange one in the family, always speaking what his body wasn’t saying. He loved words, and he often used longer ones and bigger ones around Cass on purpose. She mostly ignored them because, well, words always felt a bit meaningless, even when she longed for the right ones to use for others.

Damian stared at her dully before crossing his arms, he was still in school uniform. “It… It was a reference to something. Something everyone else knows except you, of course. Star Wars? Haven’t you heard of Star Wars before?”

She blinked at him. “No,” she answered solidly.

“Ugh, Timothy would have drug you up to the theater room and forced you to watch every single one of them with him with his running commentary track,” Damian sighed. “He did so to me.It was the day I knew for certain that he hated me.”

She said nothing, not even calling out Damian on how his body screamed that the last part was a lie. Damian was such a strangely sad child around her and around Duke. She wondered if he needed a hug.

Instead she settled for stilted conversation. “You…. clapped?” she asked, more curious than anything else.

“Is that a problem?” Damian asked sharply.

“No,” she replied.

“I recognized it. It was Faust,” he informed her. “Father and Aunt Katherine take you to the ballet quite a bit. I find it rather dull myself. But you obviously have a knack for it.”

“Hm,” Cass responded, her go-to for when Damian stumped her.

“Still, even if it’s dull, it is culture, which is more than some in this household have,” he continued. It was then that Cassandra realized that somewhere, buried beneath the words and insults, there was a thread of a compliment somehow. “And after speaking to Grayson and to Maya and to Jon, and to literally everyone else’s opinions who I have some vested interest in, I have decided to try to… bond with you, over cultured minds.”

“Hmm,” Cass continued.

There was a twitch to Damian in response. “That was not a yes.”

“That wasn’t… a question,” Cass answered.

Damian looked her up and down for a moment before squinting. His lips pursed in annoyance. “Was that your attempt at sarcasm? I’m not amused. I believe I preferred you without it.”

“Hmm,” Cass responded, walking over to the bench for some water. “Bonding?” she asked once she grabbed her water bottle and prepared to take a drink.

“Yes, that was what I was proposing,” Damian answered. “You enjoy ballet, it is winter, I assume that Aunt Katherine or Father one are already planning to take you to the Gotham Ballet’s production of The Nutcracker like they do everything else, so I am offering a more unique experience. For bonding.” He paused, unsettled for a moment, looking down then back up at Cassandra. “This is not an easy thing for me.”

Cass looked at him with a soft smile. “I know,” she answered. “When… leaving?”

“After dinner,” Damian informed her. “I would like to leave relatively soon after dinner so it would be in everyone’s best interest if you got properly dressed to go out — and for the cold weather — beforehand. That is, if you learned efficiency at all prior to living in rafters.”

Amused, Cass walked over to Damian and kissed his forehead, causing him to immediately freeze up in absolute horror. “Thank you,” she told him. “For trying.”

Flustered, he looked away, crossing his arms. “It’s an obligation, really. If you’re adopted then that makes you somewhat my responsibility. I’m Father’s son and you all being Wayne children makes you my business as much as Father’s.”

“Thank you,” Cass said again, heading toward the stairs. “Gonna get… dressed.”

“Good,” Damian answered.

“Gonna… invite Duke, too,” Cass said, halfway up the stairs. “Since… you’re chicken.”

“What!? That’s not the reason, I didn’t because… He’s not invited he’s… Damn it, Cain!” Damian sputtered, clearly embarrassed.

Cass looked back with a smirk. “Not Cain anymore.”

Damian’s shoulders relaxed as he huffed a sigh. “I know.”

He was trying. Cass couldn’t wait to tell Christine.

“You’re  joking, right?” Duke Thomas asked, eyebrow raised in suspicion and a look over Damian as if he expected evidence of some sort of mind control. Which was unnecessary since he didn’t give the same treatment to Cassandra who had been the one to actually blurt out the invitation.

“I am not in the business of wasting time with jokes, Thomas,” Damian spat back. “And you need to stop wasting time and get dressed more appropriately for the occasion. It would be all over the tabloids if the newest Waynes were looking ridiculous and the true born heir was in his best suit.”

“You talking like that is exactly why I think this is a joke,” Duke informed him. “And it’s really rubbing me the wrong way to be addressed by Thomas all of the time by you. I get it. You’re annoyed that I’m somehow shaming the name because I didn’t attach it with a hyphen like… like your previous brothers. And this is your passive aggressive retribution.”

“What?” Damian scoffed. “Don’t be ridiculous. The only person who did the ridiculous hyphen was Timothy. At least Cassandra here is sensible and dropped her old name. Dick and Todd kept their names. You aren’t special, Thomas.”

“Dick and Cass must be to go by their first names,” Duke said, leaning back in his desk chair with a clearly placid expression. He was playing the situation out like it was some sort of chess.

“Dick is… He thinks he’s special,” Damian said with a rotation of his wrist. “And Cassandra beat me at my game when she accepted the family name. I can’t put disdain behind the name Wayne. It was a fair play and I accept when I am out maneuvered. For the time being.”

Folding his fingers together, Duke hardened his expression. “You called him Timothy. Is that because he took Wayne, too.”

Damian stared back at Duke angrily. He was certain that if they went on much longer, steam would be literally escaping his ears. Why was reaching out to his so-called siblings so damn difficult? And people acted as though he was merely being ridiculous for not being civil all the damn time.

“While Timothy was alive, I called him Drake against his wishes,” Damian admitted. “It was passive aggressive. We did not get along. I knew it bothered him to be reminded he was adopted.” His carefully neutral face itched an expression into place before he quickly blinked it away and stared at Duke again. “I regret it. I regret not being close with Timothy. Because… I didn’t expect him to ever die. So when I call Todd Todd or I call you Thomas, it’s because I don’t know you. And if either of us want that to change… and I do. I do because… because the opportunity escaped me with Timothy and it is a regret I feel entirely on my own shoulders, so I’m attempting to be better. I made myself a better Robin last year. It took me an entire year of effort. Hopefully making myself a better Damian will be simpler. And involve less… ancient artifacts and carnage.”

Duke’s eyebrows were raised at the last bit but he didn’t immediately respond. His head merely tilted and he looked at Damian curiously before looking to Cassandra.

“He’s… telling the truth,” Cass announced pleasantly.

“Alright,” Duke responded. “I’ll just finish up my work here and meet you guys downstairs in a bit when I get dressed. That work for you, Damian?”

“Don’t take so much time, but fine, it will work,” Damian huffed, heading out the door. “Oh, and, Thomas? It is Friday night. No one believes you’re actually doing schoolwork. No one does schoolwork on Friday nights. You’re on Gotham forums seeing if you have featured on any of the conspiracy theory posts yet.”

“Stop going through my internet history!” Duke snapped.

Damian merely smirked and headed down the stairs. Cassandra was in hot pursuit for a good portion of it before Damian stopped, turned, and glared at her. “You are in sweat pants and a sports bra. I was partially taking into account you getting ready, too.”

Cassandra blinked at him. “Christine… won’t mind.”

“Who? I don’t even care, just put a dress on. Or a suit. I don’t care,” Damian huffed. He watched as Cass walked back up the stairs and then proceeded to roll his eyes back into his head. “I despise people. This is difficult. I refuse to allow Father to adopt a single other child or procreate again until I am at least seventeen.”

“I’m sure he’ll listen to you just fine,” Dick replied, revealing himself to be at the bottom of the stairs, holding three tickets out and waving them at Damian. “You asked Kate for these? She gave them to me when she stopped by earlier. I think you were still at school or something.”

“Was it before three?” Damian asked dully.

“Yes.”

“Then of course I was still in school,” Damian replied before leaping onto the stair rail and sliding down to meet Dick. His former partner didn’t so much as flinch, confidently watching Damian as the youngest Wayne leaped off from the rail just in time to grab the tickets and land on the floor in a single, smooth motion. “As was Thomas.”

“You should probably get used to calling him Duke,” Dick joked. “Especially if you’re going to put forward the tremendous effort of hanging out with him more. I know that takes a lot out of you.”

“You know nothing, Dick Grayson,” Damian responded, inspecting the tickets. Aunt Katherine was decently reliable, but one could never be too certain. “Not all of us can be as social as you.”

“No, though I’d argue it takes just as much effort for most people to be as asocial as you,” Dick fired back. “That takes a certain amount of genetics that’s almost unique to you.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” Damian warned.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Dick replied, looking up the stairs. “It’s good to make people feel like they belong. It’s good to remind them in the ways you can that they’re family. I tried with Jason… but I regret not doing more. Things were too tense between myself and Bruce, and I was trying to find my new safety net as an adult. I missed a lot of chances. I did better with Tim. And I did better with you,” Dick explained before looking at Damian. “It’s the hardest lesson the world teaches you.”

Damian stayed quiet for most of it, shoving the tickets in his pocket. “What’s the point? What does it matter… Timothy’s dead. Being nice to Cassandra and Duke won’t change that he died probably thinking that I’d be spitting on his grave by this point.”

For a moment, Damian didn’t expect Dick to answer, he was staring toward the door. Damian’s heart could almost stop in the killer anticipation of the moment. How much had he disappointed Dick in that moment? When would his effort be enough to make up for whatever perceived slights there had been toward their new siblings?

“I’ll be honest with you, L’il Dee,” Dick sighed. “If you’re hoping to find some sort of security, some sort of relief about what you regret with Tim through this… it’s not going to be there. We rarely get second chances to make up for those things. And even when you do… there’s not taking away the past.” Dick looked at Damian. “After tonight, if you’re really so miserable trying to be a brother to Cass and Duke, and you’re still only doing it because you’re guilty over Tim… You shouldn’t push yourself to do it anymore. Because that’s not the reason you should be doing it. You should be doing it because you don’t want to miss out on the great people who come into your life anymore. Alright?”

Damian looked Dick over and then looked back to the stairs. Cassandra was already making her way down. She had thrown on a sundress and flats — not exactly dressed up for a ballet, but not sweats and a sports bra either. Duke was walking up behind her, talking to her while she smiled and fiddling with the first button on his shirt — unsure to keep it as it was or to leave it undone.

“I want to get to know them,” Damian answered Dick lowly before looking back at him. “They’re… family, after all.”

Dick gave him a small smile then walked up the steps, arms outstretched toward Cass and Duke. “Look at you guys! All fancy and whatnot. No one gave me the memo!” He hugged Cassandra and offered a fist which Duke pounded smoothly. “Must be special if Damian invited you out somewhere. Don’t let him know I told you both this, but he’s a bit shy and tries to hide it with spiky hair and attitude.”

“No one asked you, Grayson,” Damian spat out, earning laughter from the whole group.

Dick nodded to Cass. “Give Christine my regards! I’ll be covering Gotham for you guys tonight.”

“That means you knew,” Duke pointed out with a raised brow.

“Must mean you’re the brains of this trio,” Dick winked before heading on up the stairs, no doubt going to Father’s study for the grandfather clock entrance. An unnecessary route to take given the layout of the Manor, but Damian still had a lot to learn from his mentor about showmanship.

Cassandra smiled brilliantly at Damian and lifted her skirt slightly, as if to curtsey without committing to it. “Okay?”

“You’re both fine,” Damian said with a hand wave. “Let’s not make Pennyworth wait any longer.”

“Oh, I think I’m catching on to the translation,” Duke joked to Cass as they walked behind Damian. “That must be Damian-talk for a compliment. Because you look beautiful.”

She laughed and tucked a strand of hair behind her ears. Duke joined her in laughing before coughing into his fist and looking at Damian.

“No offense, I’m just joking,” Duke offered.

“Obviously,” Damian said flatly, leading to the car. He stopped, took a breath and turned around to look at the two of them. “It was accurate and that was why you both found it humorous. I understand and accept it.”

The two new siblings glanced at each other and then to Damian.

“Uh, right. Cool,” Duke said, scratching at his ear nervously.

“That is what tonight is for. Bonding and… learning about each other,” Damian continued awkwardly. “Such as… tonight we’ll learn why Cassandra loves ballet so much. It will be an enthralling mystery and a good test of our detective skills.”

“Huh,” Duke looked at Cass. “I just thought it was because your girlfriend performed.”

Cass glowed. “Yes!”

Damian stared. “What?”

“Looks like we need to teach our little brother about detective skills,” Duke snickered, reaching forward and rustling Damian’s hair — without permission — before heading to the passenger seat of the car. “Hey, Alfred, mind if I ride with you in the front?”

Flustered, Damian sputtered, searching for a proper retort when he then received a pat on the head from Cassandra. He glared at her while she smiled.

“No worry,” she offered. “I’m… a detective. You’ll… learn.”

“I hate you,” Damian growled, stomping toward the car.

Cassandra laughed at him. “No you don’t.”

And that night, of course, was the start of a beautiful friendship. Whether it ever was admitted to out loud or not.